EUROVISION SONG CONTEST - ABBA'S BENNY: EUROVISION MEANS NOTHING FOR MUSIC

ABBA'S BENNY: EUROVISION MEANS NOTHING FOR MUSIC

One of the most famous winners of the Eurovision Song Contest no longer watches the broadcast as it "means nothing" for popular music.

Benny Andersson of Abba, who co-wrote the Swedish pop band's 1974 Eurovision winner Waterloo, criticised the irrelevance of the annual song competition.

"What it is now is possibly a great television event, but for music it means nothing," he told BBC News.

"I don't watch Eurovision, it's become so huge."

Andersson added: "It was smaller scale then [in 1974] than it is now. It might have been a little bit more meaningful in the 50s and 60s and when we entered but after that, I'm not sure if anything ever happened."

The songwriter said the show was a good spectacle, "if you can bear sitting for such a long time".

He continued: "Musically it's not what it should be. But as television it's a good show."

Andersson's criticism comes after DJ Terry Wogan, the long-term host of the BBC coverage of the song contest, quit the role in frustration at alleged bloc voting on the continent.

After the UK entry sung by a former X Factor contestant finished in last place in 2008, Wogan said he was not interested in "presiding over yet another debacle".

"Andy Abraham gave, I think, the performance of his life with a song that certainly deserved far more points than it got when you look at the points that Spain got, that Bosnia-Herzegovina got - some really ridiculous songs," he added last year.

This year's British entry, It's My Time, is sung by Jade Ewen and was co-written by West End impresario Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber.